Clair's troubles
by GlamKitty
Summary: What happens after people find out about Clair and Bender?
1. Chapter 1

_So what! Clair thought as she slammed her locker shut and leaned back onto it, grasping her books in her hand, as a blond boy stalked off down the hall with his friends after whispering "slut" behind her back. His friends were cracking up like he had told the best joke in the world. Let them laugh at me… it won't matter in the end. All of this will blow over, it has to._

But the thing was, ever since that Saturday of detention, Clair's mind had no longer been filled with the girlish things it usually was. She had spent most of her time- oh fuck it- _all_ of her time focusing her thoughts on John Bender. Everything about him intrigued her; the way he smiled and laughed; the way he kissed; the taste of his lips; the smell of his hair. All these things she just couldn't stop thinking of. Which made it worse to get all the stares and rude comments from people she thought were her friends. If she couldn't get over it, what were the chances that the gossip-and-teasing loving kids in her school would?

She had been the most popular girl in school, but somehow everyone had found out about her and John's Saturday detention kissing. After that school had been pure hell on earth. She pretended not to care, but deep down her heart was aching at every face pulled at her, every fake smile, every un-kind word thrown at her. She had only kissed him! She knew so many girls who would have gone all the way! Why did everyone expect her to be some perfect role-model all the time, never caring about her own feelings?

Clair got up from her half sitting position on against her locker and started down the hall, dreading entering home room. She had been dreading this class for so long. Every day was the same thing. The jeers at her; the un-kind words; the cat-calls. It made trying to get a good education pretty hard. Before she hadn't minded being disturbed in class. That was when it would have been a note full of juicy gossip or a friend turning in his or her chair to tell Clair something.

As she walked in she realized that today wasn't going to be any better. Someone had carved a big heart with the words "I love John Bender" into her desk. The once gleaming wooded surface was covered in red kiss marks and bright pink hearts all around the carved heart. Clair dropped her books on top of the markings, trying desperately to cover all of them.

"Wouldn't your _boyfriend_ be upset about you covering the fact that you _love_ him?" a girl named Jayne called loudly from a few seats behind her.

Clair could feel all eyes in the room on her as they laughed. _Let them laugh! _Clair thought, feeling the tears coming to her eyes. _It doesn't mean anything, so what if I love him! At least I **have **someone to love…_ But even those thoughts didn't help her this time, and soon she found tears running down her cheeks. The rest of the class quickly picked up on that fact and laughed harder.

Clair was very glad when their teacher walked in and told everyone to settle down.

"Do you need to go tot eh nurse?" he said looking straight at her

"No, I'm fine." Clair replied. Even if she felt she was being torn apart inside, she wouldn't let them have the satisfaction of driving her out of the classroom.


	2. Chapter 2

Clair had refused to let any of it get to her that day. After that first episode of tears in home room, she had made a vow for no more crying. This is what some people had to go through on a daily basis, like Alison, the girl from detention with no friends. _Aha! _Clair thought. _I am a genius! I'll just get Alison to be my friend._ With that thought Clair sped down the hall to the front steps where she could usually find Alison sitting on the steps alone, reading or writing or something near the corner.

As Clair came out the huge double doors at the front of her school, she saw Alison sitting there, her back to Clair. Clair Rushed out the door and stopped in her tracks. There in front of Alison was a boy and a girl, seeming to be deep in discussion about something or another. _ Since when did **weirdo** have friends? _Clair thought, her face revealing her emotions so much that the girl looked up and asked "Umm what do you want, Princess?"

Clair glared at her "My name's _Clair_, if you want to address me." she said coolly "And I was wondering if I could talk to Alison for a moment."

At the mention of her name, Alison whipped her head around. When her eyes rested on Clair they widened in surprise and then narrowed in suspicion. "What do _you_ want?" she spat.

Since detention that Saturday, Clair had ignored Alison like the others had predicted. The only person she really kept in contact with was John, but that was because she loved him. Alison had tried to talk to her a few times, but even with her made-over look, Alison was still the school freak, and before everyone had found out about her kissing John Bender, Clair had still been worried about her reputation. Now she had nothing to loose, and Alison knew that.

"Hey Alison." Clair said as if they had been talking to each other every day for ages "Can I have a word… in private?" She glanced at the girl and boy still sitting near Alison.

The girl was wearing all black and had short spiky hair. The guy looked much the same as the girl, but with more 'boyish' features on his face, they were obviously related. They both wore the same glaring faces as they looked at Clair and Alison. The boy spit on the ground, dangerously close to Clair's designer shoes, never taking his eyes off of her and Alison.

"What is it, Clair?" Alison asked, clearly annoyed.

"In _private_, please, Alison." Clair begged.

Alison sighed and followed Clair around the corner of the building and to the track in the yard. They started circling around it, both looking at their feet and kicking up reddish-brown dirt around them.

"So, what is it? What could take any of your precious time away from yourself, to talk to a lowly loser like myself?" Alison spat at her, glaring.

"Oh, please, Alison. I'm just coming to apologize to you after the way I treated you. I mean, you're not the only one who's allowed to act oddly because of your problems!" Clair took a breath to stop herself from getting any louder "Please, Alison, I'm at a very desperate time right now, I'm giving everything away for love. I need your help and support." tears were coming down her cheeks again now. Alison opened her mouth to say something, but Clair cut her off before she could say it "Look, I'm really sorry about what happened, I'm a total jerk for not talking to you all that time, but just look at what's happened to me! I mean, it would have been this bad if I had hung around with you too. Twice as bad even. I just want your forgiveness… please, Alison." Clair had a desperate look on her face as she looked at Alison, waiting.

"No, it wouldn't have." Alison said calmly. "I… I started telling people about you and Bender."

Clair gaped at her. Alison? She was capable of doing this in a school that didn't even know who she was? Clair felt the heat rising to her face, she raised her arm and brought it down on Alison's cheek, hard. Alison let out a little cry, and a red hand print started showing on her face.

Then Alison spoke in the same calm voice she had used before "Clair you spoke, now it's my turn. And you'd better listen."


	3. Chapter 3

_Alison turned so her whole body was facing Clair. She took a deep breath that shook her whole black-clad body. She seemed to think what she was going to say over a few times before she finally opened her mouth to start her story. _

_"Clair, when you stopped talking to me, I was kind of upset. After the way that Saturday had gone I thought that maybe we would be friends and I would be saved from the loneliness of walking around school alone every day." she took another long, shaking breath "You see, I thought you might change for the better, not worse. Now it seems all you care about is getting your princess reputation back… Clair I know you're better than that." Alison put her hands on her hips and looked at Clair waiting for her reaction._

_"But… why would you do that? Spreading rumors is a **really **bitchy thing to do!" Clair said._

_"I thought maybe if you had no one else you would come back to me. I loved when you were being nice to me before. I tried to change myself, even, to try to get you to accept me. But obviously that didn't work. So finally I got fed up of just waiting around and I took matters into my own hands. If no one else would accept you, I think you know I would always be here as a back up." Once again she took a deep breath, seemingly trying to muster the courage of what she was saying. "Then I got the idea to just look around school for more people like me… because you were taking so long to give up and come to me. And that's where these two come in. This is Andee and Justin Rose by the way. Brother and sister." Alison pointed at them in turn._

_The girl was Andee and the boy was Justin. Andee may have been pretty, but her face was full of black makeup and white powder. She had a babyish face, much like Justin's. Justin looked like he needed a good work out. He was very skinny and lanky, seeming to be swimming in an overly large black tee that looked like it may have had a band's logo on it, at one point. They were defiantly typical rejects, perfect to hang out with Alison, in Clair's mind. As Alison pointed at them, they started walking towards the two girls, seeming to have been watching them the whole time they had been talking._

_"Well, I'm here now." Clair said in a slightly whiny voice "Can we still be friends?"_

_"See, I don't know." Alison replied "I gave it some more thought and I realized that if the others accept you again, you'll be rid of me in a heart beat. Those two helped me figure out that. And, frankly Clair, I think the other kids will accept you again once one of the other "popular" girls does something as scandalous as you. I'm slightly afraid to become your friend now."_

_Tears sprang to Clair's eyes. First rejected by her own friends, then rejected by the rejects. Things couldn't get worse, and she thought that they couldn't get better either. _

_Suddenly someone ran between Andee and Justin towards where Clair and Alison were. He was tall, dressed like some street thug, with long brown hair that was blowing slightly behind him. Clair's heart skipped a beat as she recognized the face of John Bender coming towards here._

_Maybe things could get better?_

_A/N; This one's kind of short… but I want to keep the suspense in it. Aha. So anyways, review it! More soon._


End file.
